Blenderlaw

The CEBS published its High Level Principles for Remuneration Policies today. I wish some group would publish some low-level principles for a change – there’s something awfully general – even meaningless – about these very general principles (although I’m not entirely sure of the wisdom of trying to regulate remuneration either). The CEBS received 12 comments on the consultation paper, and these are available on its website. Responses were mostly from financial trade associations (although the Danish Shareholders Association and UNI Europa Finance also responded). The Italian Banking Association argued, for example, that the CEBS should conform its principles to international standards so as not to put European firms at a competitive disadvantage. The BBA suggested that using the word clawback wasn’t helpful because it isn’t a helpful legal term in some jurisdictions. But given that the document only seems to have been published in English I’m not sure it was ever meant to be used as a legal term as the laws of most of the EU countries aren’t written in English to begin with. But this is financial regulation, and we do that in English – even in a multilingual union. I do wish the Basel Committee would approach consultation – and transparency about the results of consultation more like this.